Let's Get Serious About Healthcare Costs

We are all concerned about the ever escalating healthcare costs. Employers struggle whether to offer health insurance benefits because premiums continue to rise at an alarming rate.

Employees and patients who do have insurance must endure higher, premiums, higher co-pays and coinsurance. With healthcare costs are out of control, we must consider something totally transformational.

One primary driver of rising healthcare costs is due to the way physicians practice medicine these days. Physicians order unnecessary tests, procedures and prescription drugs simply to protect themselves from being sued. This practice is known as “defensive medicine.”

And, according to Oppenheim Research, defensive medicine costs Georgians more than $14 billion each year. Eighty-two percent of the Georgia doctors polled by Oppenheimer said they practice defensive medicine.

Solutions vary. Traditional tort reform measures like caps on “pain and suffering” damages help to stabilize the medical liability insurance market. But physicians still practice defensive medicine by ordering expensive ultrasounds, CT scans, x-rays, MRIs, and dangerous medications that aren’t medically necessary.

These tests not only waste a patient’s time but cost a lot of money – sometimes tens of thousands of dollars. And patients are often exposed to radiation and other treatment options they don’t need just to give the doctor peace of mind.

A recent Gallup poll found that one-in-four healthcare dollars nationwide is spent on unnecessary tests, procedures and prescriptions. Read more >>

Gingrich Group LLC/Center for Health Transformation Statement in Response to Recent Press Inquiries

Due to confidentiality clauses in our contracts, we are not releasing a list of our clients and members or information specific to any individual client or member. However, we are releasing this document to provide information about the Gingrich Group LLC and the Center for Health Transformation, including overall revenue, scope and accomplishments.

The Gingrich Group LLC was launched in late 2000 as a strategic consulting company, with the mission of helping organizations create and implement high-impact strategies and solutions that leverage the scientific breakthroughs, new technologies and transformational opportunities present in times of great change. Our consulting clients come from a variety of industries, including healthcare, education, safety and technology among others. We do no lobbying for clients and always make that very clear from the outset. We clearly stipulated that fact in our contracts.

Our clients are made up of organizations that offer 21st Century solutions and those impacted by the changes of the 21st Century who are seeking strategic advice about how to change, innovate and transform in order to succeed. The Gingrich Group provides a team of experts in strategic thinking, policy, planning, research, coalition building, training, writing, communications and analysis.

The Center for Health Transformation was launched in 2003 as a project of the Gingrich Group. The Center is a non-partisan collaboration of leaders dedicated to the creation of a 21st Century Intelligent Health System that saves lives and saves money for every American.

The health system the Center seeks to advance is one that is centered on the individual; is IT and quality-based, is focused on wellness, prevention and optimal health, and accelerates the discovery and rapid diffusion of innovations, solutions and scientific breakthroughs that save lives and save money.

All projects we undertake at the Center are based on the goal of creating that 21st Century Intelligent Health System. To accomplish that goal, we bring together leaders and stakeholders across the spectrum, including providers, employers, vendors, professional associations, health plans, disease groups, think tanks, consumer groups and public sector leaders at both the state and federal level. 

 Read complete statement  from Nancy Desmond, Chairman and CEO, Center for Health Transformation and the Gingrich Group